Riga International Film Festival

The festival was launched in 2014 – the year Riga became the European Capital of Culture – alongside the European film awards ceremony that took place in the city, thus seizing the momentum to present Riga as an important cultural hotspot of the region.

This year the festival will maintain it’s previous nine-programme structure, incorporating the collaboration with one of Russia’s most prominent documentary film festivals Artdocfest, a joint programme with the national award Lielais Kristaps, a Nordic film panorama NORDIC HIGHLIGHTS developed together with all the Nordic embassies as well as the Nordic Council of Ministers’ Office in Latvia, and the Danish Cultural Institute in Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania; the family programme KIDS WEEKEND; the retrospective programme IN KINO VERITAS, which will focus on non-narrative cinema to try decipher the ways how our film-watching habits form, a challenge for a discussion on the very grounds on which cinematic language is built. The SHORT RIGA programme will showcase short films, experimental cinema and music video, while the RIGA IFF SELECTION – most important new cinema from Europe and the world. The festival will also host it’s second international competition. Off screen the festival will also continue developing it’s professional commitments with the EUROPEAN SCRIPT MEETING, as well as numerous analytical and creative workshops for film students, discussion panels, national premieres, parties, Q&As, lectures on film and culture.